Objectivism’s Approach to the Virtues

Tara Smith is a professor of philosophy at the University of Texas. Her main interests concern the nature of values and virtues, and the requirements of objective law. Dr. Smith is author of Judicial Review in an Objective Legal System (2015); Ayn Rand’s Normative Ethics: The Virtuous Egoist (2006); Viable Values: A Study of Life as the Root and Reward of Morality (2000); and Moral Rights and Political Freedom (1995) as well as a number of articles in such venues as The Journal of Philosophy, American Philosophical Quarterly, Law and Philosophy and Social Philosophy and Policy. Smith’s current research focuses on intellectual freedom. Dr. Smith is the BB&T Chair for the Study of Objectivism and holds the Anthem Foundation Fellowship. She is also a member of the board of directors of the Ayn Rand Institute.

Onkar Ghate is the chief philosophy officer and a senior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. He is the Institute’s resident expert on Objectivism and serves as its head trainer and editor. He has taught philosophy for over ten years at the Institute’s Objectivist Academic Center. Dr. Ghate is a contributing author to a number of books on Rand’s fiction and philosophy, including Essays on Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead”; Essays on Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”; Why Businessmen Need Philosophy: The Capitalist’s Guide to the Ideas Behind Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”; Concepts and Their Role in Knowledge: Reflections on Objectivist Epistemology; and “A Companion to Ayn Rand (Blackwell Companions to Philosophy).” His op-eds have appeared in venues that range across the ideological spectrum, from Huffington Post to CNN.com to Foxnews.com and Businessweek.com. He’s been interviewed on national and international radio, including NPR and BBC Radio, and has appeared as a television guest on CNBC, KCET, Fox News Channel and the CBS Evening News. A Canadian citizen, Dr. Ghate studied economics and philosophy as an undergraduate student at the University of Toronto and worked in the financial industry prior to joining ARI in 2000. He received his doctorate in philosophy in 1998 from the University of Calgary.